Patna: Patna city civil court lawyers on Monday abstained from judicial work to protest against the Congress-led opposition parties' notice to remove the Chief Justice of India (CJI), Dipak Misra.

The lawyers remained absent from work from 9am to 12.30pm in support of the CJI.

The lawyers' association condemned the impeachment motion brought against CJI Misra, saying it was harmful for democracy and the autonomy granted to the judiciary.

A meeting was held under the chairmanship of Patna City Bar Association president Navin Kumar Sinha rejecting the impeachment move which was supported by all the lawyers.

Sinha said: "This (impeachment) is not good for judiciary. There is no merit in the impeachment notice brought out by the opposition parties."

He added that the message gone out to the public was not right in spirit and that would hurt the judiciary's image further. Later, when the news of rejecting of the motion came out, the lawyers rejoiced the development.

Patna City Bar Association general secretary Sanjay Kumar Sinha said: "We are happy that the motion has been rejected. If this had not happened, a chaos-like situation would have arisen where one could not work independently without any bias."

He said bringing impeachment against the CJI had given a bad name to the judiciary and that should not happen in future.